Samples of VIA's Nano E CPUs Reach Customers

Amidst all the talk about six-core CPUs from Intel and Advanced Micro Devices, end-users may have forgotten that a third supplier of chips, namely VIA, is still very much alive and kicking, steadily increasing its hardware collection, not the least part of which is the Nano Series of processors. In fact, the company has only just unveiled its latest chip series, namely the Nano E, built on the 64-bit, superscalar architecture that spawned the VIA Nano 3000 Series and 2000 Series processors.

The Nano E have clock speeds of 800MHz to 1.8GHz and will “bring virtualization capabilities and extended longevity support to embedded markets.” They achieve this because they fully support advanced, high performance superscalar processing, have Pin-to-Pin compatibility with VIA Nano, VIA C7 and VIA Eden Processors and come with advanced thermal and power management. Additionally, they have an idle power draw of 100mW.

“VIA Nano E-Series processors have been designed to facilitate the shift towards new technologies that will shape the embedded industry for years to come,” Daniel Wu, vice president, VIA Embedded Platform Division, VIA Technologies, said. “The VIA Nano E-Series will mean that technologies such as 64-bit computing and virtual software deployment will become the norm, not the exception for tomorrow's embedded system developers.”

The VIA Nano E Series CPUs feature VIA VT virtualization, which allows “legacy software and applications to be used in virtual scenarios without impacting on performance.” Furthermore, they come with the VIA PadLock Security Engine, which brings the added benefit of hardware-based data encryption.

Unfortunately, it is unclear when mass production will begin, but, considering that the chips are already sampling, it shouldn't be too long before they show up. Of course, end-users interested in additional information may find it on the company's official website or directly from the VIA Nano product page.